


Warm Bodies

by Arubi, derekstilinski



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Zombie Apocalypse, Alternate Universe - Zombies, Cannibalism, F/M, M/M, Minor Character Death, Murder Family, Zombie Apocalypse, Zombies
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-06-23
Updated: 2013-07-17
Packaged: 2017-12-15 21:53:31
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 6
Words: 12,027
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/854431
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Arubi/pseuds/Arubi, https://archiveofourown.org/users/derekstilinski/pseuds/derekstilinski
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A fic based on an AU Prompt of a teen wolf version of the movie 'Warm Bodies'.</p><p>---</p><p>“So… What’s your name?” Derek asks, pushing around a canned peach with his plastic fork. </p><p>“Uh.” Is the zombie’s response, much more intelligent than he’d originally thought the corpses were. Sure, it’s not a full conversation, but this one tries. This one saved him, and didn’t eat him while he slept.</p><p>“Do you not have a name?” He asks, looking at the confused expression on the corpse’s face. Maybe he can’t remember it. Derek thinks it’s sad. </p><p>“Uh. St…Uh, I..” It tries, scratching at the buzz cut hair, foggy eyes searching the room and then Derek’s face. </p><p>“…Stuart?” He supplies, but the corpse shakes his head, nose turned up. “Steven? Stu? S…Stiles?”</p><p>“Huh?” That catches his attention, the last one. </p><p>“Stiles.” Derek nods, thinking it’s odd, but good. Like him. “That can be your name. Okay?” </p><p>Stiles does something like a smile, “Oh…Okay.”</p><p>---</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> All rightful credits go to 
> 
> http://derekstilinski.tumblr.com/
> 
> AU Prompt here:
> 
> http://derekstilinski.tumblr.com/post/53209523957/sterek-au-warm-bodies-so-whats-your-name

 

 

 

 

**~ WARM BODIES ~**

 

He doesn’t know what he’s supposed to do. He’s lost and they’re coming, slowly creeping towards him. There's nowhere to go, only one door and that is where they are coming from. He’s panting heavily, back against the last line of glass cabinets, the thick smell of medicine and death does nothing to calm him down. He has to get out of here. Fast. He needs to find Laura; this was where she went to bring the supplies, but her heartbeat is out of his reach. 

It’s only been a couple of hours, she couldn’t be dead – she knows how to take care of herself – and he- he- 

Derek breaths heavily, sweat has formed on his skin, dampening his shirt and everything else. The idea of Laura being truly gone feels like a shock dealt to a piece of wood – it doesn’t connect. He’s too stunted and detached to truly feel sad about it, his body is not his own, and he’s controlling it from a place far away. 

Like a corpse, he thinks.

He peeks out from behind the cabinet, and stares at the group of them coming toward him hungrily, his scent luring them like a drug. When he turns back to sit, there is one of them standing in-front of him.

The surprise has him jerking back quickly, inhaling hungrily and trying to keep himself from resigning completely. But he does. He surrenders. He just sighs and let everything out. He wants to die, he never particularly admitted it to himself, but despair has led him to believe that death would solve everything. Derek silently thinks about his family, about the growing hope that soon he might be with them again. He doesn’t believe in heaven, nor hell, but maybe, he’ll try to believe that.

The man – corpse – moving ever closer to him is thin and tall, its figure sleek and smooth, almost elegant for what it is. Derek thinks it was once beautiful; its youth showing even through the thick layer of disease that shadows its eyes, and makes its mouth repugnant.

The Corpse lowers itself, sinks to the ground where he sits, and hunches its head over his shoulder; silent, its gaze never leaving his. Derek can't bring himself to stare at the empty eyes, and when he can feel the corpse’s sickly breath onto his shoulder’s skin, he braces himself with glazed eyes. Waiting for it to happen.

Anxiously so.

The corpse, instead, caresses his face with stuttering cold arms, and leaves a trail of decayed blood along his skin. It overwhelms his senses, and he doesn’t understand. Derek can hear the steps of the other corpses, the groans becoming sharper, and knows they are close.

“Sa-fe Nnn-ow.” The red-hooded corpse mutters weakly, almost unintelligibly, and then stands up and joins the rest of them.  They move past him, and keep going. The red hooded corpse looks back at him, expectant, and waits for him to rise. Derek only realizes then that the corpse had masked him; he stands up, and then follows.

 

* * *

 

He kills her because that’s what he does. He thinks.

He’s not sure.

She’s beautiful, her skin is pale and her hair is black – he likes them that way. He believes.

The brain is the most intriguing part; it’s what he hungers for, what he wants and needs. Their brain is what keeps him… alive, what keeps him looking forward to something – the only anchor he has to that holds him from falling down and become a nothing, like them.

They call them bonies, those who give up on the dying flame that is their humanity. He doesn’t blame them for succumbing, the ever present feeling of despair tears through the thickest sacks.

Him and Scott promised each other that they’d never give in, every day, silently.

It’s the promise they made before they were attacked.

The one thing that they have left of what used to be their humanity.

Her brain makes every inch of his insides tingle with excitement, like an itch that makes you tickle all over and jerk over sensitively. He hungers for the memories – the images.

The first few are of a large family, black haired people; young and old. The family play and dance and cheer, it makes him clasp where his- he doesn’t know what it is- lies, and it hurts. He forgot how that felt. Something inside him is aching. And then they die. Fire blooms in his vision and everything turns red, and then there's only a boy. There’s a boy who keeps crying, and then he turns silent, and finally cold.

Almost as cold as he is, the penetrating sharp pain has him reeling back from the euphoria.

The memories fade, and just before taking the next bite, he smells a familiar scent.

It’s a heartbeat. And it’s as cold as the dream.

But somewhat hopeful.

* * *

 

Derek follows the corpse to the roof of the airport, everything here is new to him, too used to living in the shelter of the woods with Laura. They get inside a plane, and he’s terrified, he wonders if the corpse intends to attack him now that they are alone.

It keeps glancing at him, and then back to its own path. It’s trying to talk and try, but all Derek can hear is groaning; all he can see is the remains of a man locked in a decaying body.

His eyes widen when it puts on music, the rhythm is slow and without lyrics – just what Derek likes. The idea that the man – corpse – is trying to be civil alludes him, it is preposterous, they can’t think; they only hunger, and he has to find his sister.

It moves towards one of the seats, and sits down, movements ragged and limp. He needs to get out of here, but when he tries for the door, the thing immediately reaches for him, and pushes him back. Sudden awareness dawns on him and he sinks back to one of the chairs, trying to gain distance. The body hunches forward a little, and then makes a noise that seem like a word. It keeps trying, but failing. Derek nods, almost encouragingly – trying to understand.

“N-n..ot S-a-fe” It raises a hand and points outside of the window. Derek nods again, this time, he comprehends.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The zombie nods, and then mutters a ‘don’t run’. It is the first almost words coming out from the man, and Derek is a little overwhelmed. They stand up, and Derek knows the zombie means to run towards their – his – its plane.
> 
> Only there’s an entire horde of corpses running amok on the roof, searching for him. Derek hinges forward to run, but thin fingers stop him abruptly.
> 
> “Don’t run.” It says again. “Play dead.”
> 
> Derek furrows his eyebrows, uncomprehending.
> 
> Then the zombie overreacts his movements, and realization dawns upon him. He imitates a walking zombie, and they slowly make it towards the plane, even if he earns some curious glances in return. Like he’s the weird one.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I hope it is satisfying and thank you for all your wonderful comments. I appreciate all and any kind of feed-back immensely, please do call me out on any i I make. There are some variations from the original movie 'Warm Bodies', however I'm simply going to base it closely to it, not exactly, putting in some changes when the situation demands for them.

He knows when a man needs his space, to understand his surroundings, he’s not dumb. Well he is, he thinks, but that’s not the point. He forgot his point. Did he have a point? He doesn’t know. But, he knows he doesn’t have to stick close to the guy to learn about him. Eating his familiar’s brain is an unorthodox method, but beggars can’t be choosers. He remembers that idiom, that’s good. 

He dives into the memories with a hunger to learn about the man, every ounce leaving him with thirst for more. He can see the man and the woman, they’re in an embrace – and then they’re eat together. Fire keeps burning. He wonders if they’re lovers, but he looks through the woman’s eyes and there’s a rush of protectiveness and – yes, he’s her brother. He eats more, and the memories continue, until then a sudden sharp pang of something brutally cold hits him and he wants to throw it all out. He doesn’t understand what it is, but then he sees them again, this time the woman – Laura – shouting at him and blaming him. At the man.

“You were so stupid! You let them all in! You killed them all! Our own family Derek.”

The woman falls down crying, but the man – Derek – remains stagnant, oddly unmoving. As if he suddenly froze all over. The woman is drunk. Flashes go by fast and there’s embraces and comfort, but the man remains with eyes which seem broken.

He vomits, and then saunters back to home, wondering if Derek stills sleeps.

 

Everything, everywhere, is silent. Eerily stagnant. Derek sits hunched over on the plane’s farthest seat, closest to the other door on the back. He wakes up to eyes staring at him unnervingly, as if they’re trying to speak on their own. It doesn't move, simply sits limply on a seat and watches. It’s cold. The smell of rot sends shivers through his body.

Derek is still stupefied as to why it hasn’t attacked him, it confounds him, and so he decides to look back at it. It’s not as ugly as he used to think corpses were, sure its eyes are pulled back and shadowed, and its mouth is bloody and sickly looking; his skin is white and milky, like one could peal it off easily – but it is oddly, normal, when one spends enough time looking at it.

He – it, stands up and then goes to switch on the music, like it did earlier. Derek’s eyes follow apprehensively as it once again walks back towards him.

“What are you doing?... Please leave me alone.” Derek says, it’s a weak plea, but he hopes desperately it can understand.

***

He then gets a small sheet from the hand luggage of the plane and then puts it, clumsily, on Derek; who now sits closer to the edge of the seat.

“Why me?” Derek asks, not angrily, but somber.

“Why did you save me?” This time his eyes are filled with repressed tears, and it hurts.

It seems to him that Derek’s question is not accusatory, but almost like he got something he didn’t deserve. As if being saved wasn’t something he wanted.

He smiles at the man, and decides to put on the music again.

They sit there in silence for a while, not one of them talking or doing anything. Well, one of them cannot literally talk. But Derek can talk. But he doesn’t. He doesn’t get it, if he could talk he’d never stop.

Derek later breaks the awkward silence.

“I need food.” He says, shiftily. 

***  
It’s friendly, Derek finally concludes, it has to be. It could have killed him a million times, maybe its waiting until it gets hungry again. Until then, he’ll have to find a way to escape.

“I’m starved.” He sustains, narrows his eyes to appear more serious.

The corpse nods, unbelievably so, and then stands up, instinctively causing him to jerk back a little, then walks off. Just before it leaves it glances back at him, and murmurs something intelligible.

Derek quickly looks at it getting further away from the plane, counts fifteen seconds, and then rushes off the plane. Once outside he runs to the closest door into the airport he can find, but he suddenly notices a corpse sauntering around. He hopes it didn’t see him, and runs off to hide behind one of the plane’s wheels. He pants heavily, and checks out if it’s following him. There are now five of them. Cursing inwardly he tries to think of something – anything – that can help him mask himself from them. Nothing.

There are a couple of moments of eerie silence before he feels one of them with their hands on his back. He closes his eyes, quickly turns, and shoves the corpse to the ground, reacting on instinct. The zombie struggles for a while, and then groans.

He recognizes that groan. Derek quickly opens his eyes and realizes it’s him – it. 

“Sorry –“ He tries to say, baffled.

Him stands up quickly and reaches for his face, leaving once again traces of bloodied dirt. It’s almost a repeat of the first time.

The zombie nods, and then mutters a ‘don’t run’. It is the first almost words coming out from the man, and Derek is a little overwhelmed. They stand up, and Derek knows the zombie means to run towards their – his – its plane.

Only there’s an entire horde of corpses running amok on the roof, searching for him. Derek hinges forward to run, but thin fingers stop him abruptly.

“Don’t run.” It says again. “Play dead.”

Derek furrows his eyebrows, uncomprehending.

Then the zombie overreacts his movements, and realization dawns upon him. He imitates a walking zombie, and they slowly make it towards the plane, even if he earns some curious glances in return. Like he’s the weird one. 

“I wasn’t lying.” He says.

The zombie looks at him dumbly.

“I really am hungry.” He forces out, eyes looking everywhere but at the corpse in embarrassment.

The corpse grins. Mouth wide, it’s a little disgusting, but also slightly adorable.

-

For an abandoned airport who has been the stronghold of undead zombies who feed on people and nothing else, the place has awesome food. He happily dives into the canned peach and other preservatives. The zombie stares at him in awe.

“So… What’s your name?” Derek later asks, pushing around a canned peach with his plastic fork.

“Uh.” Is the zombie’s response, much more intelligent than he originally thought the corpses were. Sure, it’s not a full conversation, but this one tries. This one saved him, and didn’t eat him while he slept.

“Do you not have a name?” He asks, looking at the confused expression on the corpse’s face. Maybe he can’t remember it. Derek thinks it’s sad.

“Uh. St…Uh, I..” It tries, scratching at the buzz cut hair, foggy eyes searching the room and then Derek’s face.

“…Stuart?” He supplies, but the corpse shakes his head, nose turned up. “Steven? Stu? S…Stiles?”

“Huh?” That catches his attention, the last one.

“Stiles.” Derek nods, thinking it’s odd, but good. Like him. “That can be your name. Okay?”

Stiles does something like a smile, “Oh…Okay.”

“That’s a start.” Derek nods to himself.

“Tiles.” It – He says. “Stiles…. Stiles.” He repeats it again happily.

“Stiles. I need to get out of here.” Derek says seriously.

“Mmm-mmm” It suddenly shakes its head apprehensively. “Not- safe.” This time much more clear, maybe because he is not hungry.

“Listen Stiles, I know you saved my life, but I need to go h-“Derek stops, crunches his nose as if he tasted something bad. He has no home left.

“H-h-have to wait… They’ll notice.” It’s slow and he stutters a-lot, but he’s talking almost like- like a normal person.

Derek exhales. “How long?”

“F-f-few d-days.” Its eyes are wide and hoping and lost. “They’ll forget.” 

Stiles breathes again, struggling to get the words out, but this time managing. “You’ll be o-o-kay.” He smiles reassuringly.

“Are there others like you?” Derek wonders if Stiles understands him; they both aren’t very good with words. He hasn’t had a conversation with anyone but his sister – and he didn’t have much of those, not lately – in a long time.

Stiles shrugs. It seems to Derek that Stiles is different than the others, or maybe the other are as intelligent, but never were given the chance – or the motivation to try.

“I’ll stay. For a few days.” He exhales, and then tries a smile.

Stiles smiles back, and his face brightens.


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> They continue playing like that for quite a long time, actually Derek plays, and Stiles helplessly tries to keep up – or do what is asked of him. It sucks that he cannot be of any more fun, as he tries to reciprocate, he realizes he never wanted to be human more than now. But he does smile, he grins so happily when he finally catches the ball from going into the net. Derek jumps and fists thin air and howls and Stiles; Stiles is alive.
> 
> Their eyes lock for a while then, a sudden silence falls, and Derek gives a small nod. As if congratulating each other after a battle, a victory. It’s dark now and the moon soars thin and angular, they both lie on the grass and let the fresh air in, gazing at the stars, and sometimes each other.

He likes Stiles. The name sounds oddly familiar, emphasis on the odd, yet somewhat it belongs to him. It feels like he finally has an identity. He isn’t just a random corpse anymore.

Derek likes cars, he learns with horror, fast cars. They are driving to – what it seems to him – a blurring speed, running around one block after the other. It’s a little refreshing, how suddenly everything is moving so fast, so intense. He wants to bask in this growing feeling that has his insides buzzing, even if on the outside, he’s still dead.

Derek’s lips curve up involuntarily sometimes, and then he grimaces when he realizes he’s smiling. It’s weird, Stiles thinks.

They stumble upon a large ground made of thick overgrown grass and surrounded by decayed broken seats. Maybe it used to be an arena, Stiles tries to remember where he knows them, but cannot.

“Do you know how to play?” Derek asks as he slows down the car, and looks longingly at the empty yard. Burnt down buildings overhead scatter the dimming sunlight all over the pitch and induces a cool calm evening sensation.

Stiles shakes his head, he doesn’t know how to play… anything. It is embarrassing, if he could be embarrassed, but it’s not his fault. He doesn’t remember. He doesn’t know. His brain is all locked everywhere and although the bars are thinning, he still can’t get out.

Derek grins, a full blown grin with teeth, and something inside Stiles bursts.

“I’ll show you.” He hops of the car and runs to a ball, it lacks enough air to make it solid and circular, but Derek seems happy with it. Stiles gets out of the car and follows him. He can walks straighter these days, and the mass that used to keep him hunched over towards the ground seems to be getting lighter. His body seems more his own.

Derek kicks the ball, sending it flying towards him, but Stiles simply stares at it and lets it hit him, causing him to fall off. That alarms Derek, and he rushes over Stiles, worry written over his face. Stiles tries a smile, and then Derek laughs.

“Forgot you’re a zombie, thought it’d hurt you.” He shrugs it off, and then goes for the ball rolling away.                                                                                                          

They continue playing like that for quite a long time, actually Derek plays, and Stiles helplessly tries to keep up – or do what is asked of him. It sucks that he cannot be of any more fun, as he tries to reciprocate, he realizes he never wanted to be human more than now. But he does smile, he grins so happily when he finally catches the ball from going into the net. Derek jumps and fists thin air and howls and Stiles; Stiles is alive.

Their eyes lock for a while then, a sudden silence falls, and Derek gives a small nod. As if congratulating each other after a battle, a victory. It’s dark now and the moon soars thin and angular, they both lie on the grass and let the fresh air in, gazing at the stars, and sometimes each other.

While Derek sleeps, Stiles goes to feed on his sister’s remnants, and this time the images that flash are similar to the ones he had already seen. The two siblings dine, sleep and live together and they gaze at stars too, but there are also fights, flashes of Laura drunk and looking at Derek like people looked at _him_. Eyes filled with restrained hate and accusatory and blaming. But he is the corpse, Derek- Derek- is more human than anyone he’s ever met.

The fights grow more frequent than the calm nights, until Laura storms off after they sit silently – they had a fight before, Stiles recognizes the agony now. He wonders, confused, how one can love a person so much, yet hate them too. Laura, to Stiles, seems torn, and when she strolls into the airport, lost and crying tears of true remorse. She doesn’t see the corpse coming from behind her, such a coward, Stiles thinks. Turn and fight back, he wants to yell at her, have another chance, he wants to say.

It’s all she wants, he knows as he looks through her eyes, all she wants is to love Derek and get rid of the bitterness that has slowly wrecked her. But she cannot, instead the corpse kills her, and it is him. He is the corpse.

He spits out the brain, repulsed and in dry tears himself, and then runs back to Derek.

When he returns, Stiles smiles at Derek, who is not asleep, but instead awake and gazing out of the tiny square window of the plane. Slow sinister music is playing, it is what Derek likes, Stiles learned.

But he can’t keep his eyes from reflecting his torment, and he cannot keep himself from feeling what she felt. Something inside of him speaks, as if he could ever be her. 

-

“Do you know… have you seen my sister?” He asks Stiles because he’s aware Stiles knows the truth; the sudden expression of awareness gives him away.

Stiles remains silent.

“Is she dead?” He then asks, and he knows the answer, it is obvious.

Stiles nods, and it’s a blow he wasn’t expecting to hurt so much. He had prepared himself for a long time, and he gradually became used to death. He inhales.

“Will she come back… as one of you?” He wants to know.

Stiles shakes his head.

“I suppose, that is good. I’m glad.” He shifts a little from where he sits, his back against the aluminium wall and he is playing with a cd cover.

Stiles looks at him, a little confused. Probably he expected tears. There are, they’ve been coming out for years, but they just won’t come out anymore. “In… my world, as a human, you kind of get used to the idea of death. I’m sad, I am. But…”

The Sinatra plays wonderfully in the background, and they don’t say anything else.

Derek is thankful for it, for the easy silence, perhaps it is because Stiles can’t and has nothing to say. Perhaps because he is indifferent, but Derek is grateful nonetheless. He flips the cd cover and lets it drop on the floor with a low thump.

It is then that he remembers that Stiles is not human. He is a corpse. Sure he is one that tries and is… unique, but hunger drives him nonetheless, and Derek is counting the days till Stiles breaks his silly delusion that they could be comrades.

“Stiles I have to go. I have to get out of here.” He tries one last time, but Stiles shakes his head.

“N-not safe.”

“I know it is not safe. But I also know that you can get me out of here. You can’t keep me locked in here.”

Stiles’ face twists as if something stings him.

“I actually had a nice time here. I never thought I could meet someone like you, and for that I’m grateful.” He says sincerely.  “But I need to… go.” Where, he does not know.

“W-wait a… little m-more” Stiles gets out, and after a couple of seconds wakes up and goes to the very front of the plane and sits there alone. The atmosphere grows eerie and the music drowns all signs of life, just like it will drown him if he kept falling for his desires. The music got his family killed once, the music killed his sister, and now it wants to kill him. The basic instinct to survive even when he doesn’t see a reason to confounds him, but he entrusts in it even so, maybe because he doesn’t want Stiles to be his murderer. He doesn’t want Stiles to remember him as just food. If only he could remember.

Or maybe, he wants Stiles to be the one to end his life, that’s why he stayed with the corpse for so long.

This time he’s more vigilant as he passes through the rooftop and into the large building, he just has to make it out, everywhere is made of glass and bars of metal. There are long stairs and the filthy stench of rot hits him anew, he doesn’t remember Stiles smelling like this, maybe it was because he got used to his particular odour. He quickly runs down the stairs and checks every door in sight, silently deciding which one would be best. He then decides that he’d have to make a lucky guess, and runs to the closest one, only to have the door barged by a hand from behind him.

He looks closely to it, and knows that it is not Stiles. He quickly ducks and throws the corpse away, quickly retrieving a piece of scrap metal and tries to run to the opposite side. It is useless, three more arrive and the rest follow closely after from the main glass door. They surround him, groaning in hunger and delight. He recognizes some of them as the ones he followed after with Stiles when he saved him the very first time.

He’s trembling involuntarily, and when one of them charges at him he quickly knocks it out with a sharp blow, causing the others to take a step back, but not retreat; it seems to him almost as if they were waiting him out. Another two charge against him and he narrowly dodges them, hits them hard and jerks back, trying to get distance. Groans echo throughout the hall and the voices hurt his head. There’s one of them who seems to be more vigilant than the others, as he quickly leaps at him and doesn’t relent. He’s afraid of getting bitten, immortality is the thing he least desires.

Two of them are thrown back from their rear and through the floor; they roll and stand up groggily, only to be beat up by- by Stiles. He’s here. Derek exhales in relief, but then the one he’s struggling with throws him away, and turns to Stiles, confused.

“Him. A-a-live!” It says, voice hoarse but as steady.

“I k-know” Stiles says.

“A-live… e-eat!”

Stiles shakes his head, but the other one, eyes brown, angular jaw with Mexican eyes groans angrily.

“Eat!”

Stiles just shakes his head again, an almost shrug, but instead Stiles quickly takes Derek by his arm and runs to the farthest door away from them. They quickly go down the large metal stairs, and his eyes widen when he sees an entire horde of corpses looking at him through the windows of glass, eyes hungry and cries haunting.

They keep running, Stiles limp but trying, and Derek following while trying to make out where they are heading to. They make it to the back of the first floor, to which he recognizes is in the direction to where the cars are, but suddenly Stiles stills completely. A skeleton screeches at them from the side, its bones rattle with fury and there is nothing about it remotely human or distinctive. They run faster this time and head to the back door as fast as they can, Derek outruns Stiles, but waits for him to get through before closing the door, shutting out the skeleton in time.

“B-bonies” Stiles says, afraid, not for himself, but for Derek.

“The parking zone Stiles.” Derek says quickly, and Stiles nods and starts running again until they reach open ground out of the airport. There are at-least six skeletons waiting for them, and a sudden awareness of despair and adrenaline rushes through Derek. He grabs Stiles and they run back, trying to find another door out. They try several doors, but finally they get to the right one. Derek quickly searches for the car he drove last time, he still has the keys in his pocket, and when he doesn’t find it he feels like yelling at empty air. The corpses are coming quickly, having traced them, and he knows they don’t have any time left. The brown eyed corpse, with the angular jaw and somewhat fond expression on his face, suddenly appears, seated in a lifter, and grins at them.

“What the hell?” Derek asks.

Stiles grins. “It’s o-k-kay.”

They hop on the vehicle, much to Derek’s bewilderment, and drive off away from the close steps of the bonies.

They drive up to where they find their red car and Derek is about to rush to it when he sees an entire horde of corpses, most of them from earlier when Stiles saved him from them, looking at him. Standing between them and the only way for them to escape. Stiles looks back at them and there is horror written all over his face. Derek gulps, waiting for them to come forward, this time he knows they have no chance. Nothing happens. They do not charge at him, instead they stand there, blank eyes searching him up and down and trying to understand.

Scott nods at Stiles, the two seemingly having a silent conversation between them, and Stiles walks forward and stops besides him. The zombies look somewhat curiously at them, their expressions almost envious.

Stiles trembles a little, and then takes his hand. They walk forward and it is… strange. Unreal. Surreal. Amazing.

The Zombies step away and let them pass, their faces seem to crack from what, beneath the surface, struggles to come out. They get in the car, and drive away.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I hope I managed to co-ordinate and structure the scenes where the two escape from the airport in a satisfying manner. Please do feel free to comment and give me any tips/suggestions/corrections. There is nothing I appreciate more than feedback.
> 
> Thank-you


	4. Chapter 4

The road away from the airport is oddly silent, the groans and noises seem to have died the farther they got, only the rustling of the gale wind remains. It is nightfall by now, the skies darkened and a half moon looms over hills too far away. Derek drives them to Beacon Hills, his hometown, and where his family died; the village was deserted over six years ago, and now there is no hint of anyone in it.

The memories hit him head on, the cheering and liveliness of the small town filled with people, how he loved those times when his entire family would go to street fares and he would hide behind Laura because clowns scared him. Nonetheless they’ve been gone for a very long time now. Stiles looks around curiously, yet somewhat aware, as if Beacon Hills isn’t completely new to him. It’s a good couple of miles away from the airport, and it is hidden by trees and hills alike, yet not even their cover spared it for too long from devastation.

He doesn’t stop by his home – house, now charred to the brink of form, because it would bring too many painful memories. Instead he drives them to a random residence; they get out of the car and Stiles kicks the door open. Expectedly it is completely empty, but there are many photos lying around and it is more than hospitable. Derek knows it used to be a warm, inviting home, once, but now it is stale and cold – lifeless.

Stiles saunters to a camera standing on a wooden stand in the farback of the living room, beside the couch, and slowly examines it.

“Have you ever used one of those?” He wonders if Stiles would remember.

Stiles nods, expression lost.

“Maybe with your family?”

There is a sudden silence, Derek doesn’t know anything about Stiles beyond what he is; he knows nothing of what he used to be. Who were his family? Friends? What lead him to his final moments as a human? He wishes to ask these questions, and he wants to clasp Stiles in his hands and beg him to remember – anything that would make him more than an empty shell.

Stiles lifts the camera, and the flash brightens momentarily as he clicks on it, the snapshot is of Derek. He hasn’t looked at himself in a very, very long time, and when he sees the picture he is startled. He never knew that he looked so sombre, and that his expression was this sad. He almost tries a tentative smile, maybe to prove himself that it was just a momentary shot, but he knows that gloom has been his default expression for a while. He looks so old and broken and he wants, so badly, to hide. He takes the camera in his hand and then takes a picture of Stiles, whose face seems more alive than his own; it baffles him how Stiles, even as a corpse, is so full of life and energy. His face brims off it, its chalky paleness has somehow turned, unbeknownst to him, into fair pearl skin; his eyes are big honey orbs that say too much on their own. It seems to him almost as if he is the one better suited to being a corpse, not Stiles.

Stiles looks at it hurriedly, confused by how he looks, and Derek huffs a small laugh.

They take more photos, obviously, and while he sits and reads one of the books on the shelves Stiles busies himself exploring every inch of the house. By one in the morning Derek is dozing off on the couch, book still on his lap, and Stiles is playing with a big crystal cube that glows a pretty blue which lulls him to a deep slumber.

He wakes up to the scattering of blue light in his eyes, and he looks at it as his vision gets clear, the crystal is no longer a cube, but now it is in the form of a wolf’s head. He gawks at it, and then quickly rubs his eyes, thinking he imagined it, but the blue wolf’s face looks at him just the same. It reminds him of Laura’s pendant that she always carried around.

“Stiles?” He is nowhere to be found, and for a moment Derek panics.

“Stiles?!” Shouting louder, he gets up from the couch and heads to the kitchen, where he finds Stiles fiddling with the remnants of the blue crystal, seemingly molten by a hot wired knife. It astounds him, there is no way a corpse could have such delicacy – be able to do something in so much detail, and so beautifully. He doesn’t realize the carved wolf’s head is still in his palm until Stiles looks at it, somewhat dazed looking – almost tired.

“You did this?” Derek asks, voice a notch higher involuntarily.

Stiles nods.

“How? You shouldn’t be…” He trails off, and gazes at him with intent.

Stiles shrugs, seemingly as baffled as him, but then smiles. “I think… I u-used to.” He gets out quite easily, and Derek would have mistaken him for a human if he didn’t know any better.

Derek spends the day reading on the couch, fascinated by the old sensation of delight that stirs in him as he travels from reality to fantasy, and sometimes he looks at the crystal sitting on the stand next to the couch, gazing at him with pinched out eyes. Stiles seems somehow restless, he stares at him for long periods and then back to the floor. Derek can almost hear him thinking and trying to do something, but he’s lost to what.

It is evening when Stiles, now sitting next to him and reading along, stands up and hovers. He moves in-front of the window, and open the sewn shut curtains. The orange light peers inside the room and offers a peaceful feeling, but Derek knows something is wrong. He wonders briefly if Stiles wants to eat- attack him, if his hunger is taking over, but Stiles doesn’t seem hungry – at all.

“Derek.” He finally says as he looks up at the darkening sky.

“Yea?” 

“Your sis-ter… I-I… I w-was-“He stutters almost intelligibly. “I k-killed her.” He heaves out the last and Derek inhales sharply.

“What?” It’s low and weak.

Stiles turns and hands him the pendant. “I’m so s-sorry,” He repeats miserably, voice hoarse and cracked. Derek feels a little dazed as the pieces fit in together, as he recognized why similarity between the pendant and the crystal.

It breaks him a little, too. And he didn’t think he’d cry, but the realization dawns on him only now, truth only hits him now; his sister, she who he loved more than anything died. It was Stiles who killed her, and then Derek huffed a laugh in between his heaves of supressed tears, somewhere in his heart he suspected this.

“Why couldn’t you stop yourself… with her?” He clenches his jaw, refusing to cry, and instead continues angrily. “Why me?”

“It is b-because s—she… We g-get me-mories of th-ose who we… eat,” A moment of silence passes, and Stiles sighs, exhausted. “Her m-memories and f-feelings h-helped me.”

“D-Derek?” He – it gets out.

Derek doesn’t reply.

Stiles falls on the floor and rests on the somewhat strangely feeling surface, head gazing towards the empty ceiling; he hears Derek’s pained heartbeat, and drifts to an unfamiliar darkness, unaware that it wasn't Derek's heartbeat that he heard, and that Derek is gone.

 


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The penultimate chapter is up!

**Scott**

He never managed to remember his own name, not till now, red hood always used to try and mumble it. Scott. Red hood always said it started with an ‘s’, he keeps grinning to himself, happy that he managed to remember it, finally. Red hood will be proud. His name is Scott; he knows it as if he never forgot it in the first place. There’s a constant warm buzzing inside of him, and it started the moment he saw red hood and the human together, holding hands with eyes so hopeful they rekindled his own hope – thirst to be more.

He keeps staring at the giant glass window separating the left wing from the main hall of the airport; he usually doesn’t like it here, too close to the bonies, but he has been at a loss when it came to what he should do since he helped red hood go. It does sadden him, but he knows he’ll see them again, at the very least to tell them that something has changed. The image of red hood and his human together keeps flashing in his mind repeatedly, god how he wants that back, his life that is. This is the first time since he died that he ever got to really memorize anything, to keep something for his mind that isn’t bound to instincts like hunger. Images of him with a girl who has dark long hair, fair skin and beautiful eyes holding his hands keep reappearing in his mind. He wonders if they are newly found imagination, or memories. It is changing all of them; he can feel it. The silent big guy with dark skin and brown eyes is standing behind him and this is the first time he isn’t really silent, instead he brims with energy, a shy smile on his face as he stares at empty space – seemingly lost in his own… memories.

There’s a sudden overwhelming desire to get lost in the memories, it seems to him that this is the farthest he can get from the hollow lines of utter despair; the tingling sensation of possibilities soothes his otherwise frozen body.

The brutal roar of a skeleton snaps him out of his daze; both him and the others still. Their reflection on the big glass alerts him of just how close they are, already inside the room. One of them walks straight to him, expression hungry and it terrifies him a little, but he still feigns nonchalance, unwilling to show them his fear. And then he realizes that they aren’t looking for him, but for red hood, and his human.

* * *

**Stiles**

Corpses do not dream.

He knows it is a fact, for he hasn’t dreamed since the day he woke up in this dead shell, yet he walks through paths of green towering trees and he can _feel_ the crunching of leaves underneath him; he can feel the air gliding on his skin and the flashes of light that break through the overhead canopy.

So what is it if not a dream? This enveloping sensation of feelings that threaten to break at any moment and awaken him. He looks around and walks forward, dodging thick broken logs and jerking in awareness of the rattling of undergrowth as the smallest of animals run away or hide. He inhales, one long deep breath that fills his lungs, not with the odour of blood which used to ignite his instincts, but the scent of refreshing cold and mask and green. He wonders vigilantly if he could always smell all this, but simply forgot to recognize anything that wasn’t blood and didn’t satisfy his hunger.

He finally reaches a large clearing, the trees spread apart and let the blinding light in, he instinctively reaches up and covers his eyes. Once adjusted, he peeks through and lowers his arms. There is a large house, burnt down and somewhat shadowed, as if the sunlight couldn’t reach it, blocked by an invisible barrier. Derek is standing on the front lawn and he appears to be smaller and younger looking, his body is less built and more fragile, yet healthier – skin fair and eyes big with a strong hint of warmth to his face. Stiles strolls forward, scared of intruding, but instead feeling familiar to this place.

Only then he realizes there is someone else; a lady with blonde curly hair, narrow waist and high black heals. She looks strangely alien when compared to the surrounding, as if she doesn’t belong with the rest of _everything_.  She keeps repeating something to Derek; her hands and legs are crossed and she has a smile on her face. Stiles doesn’t feel like any of this provides comfort, or happiness, so he doesn’t understand her.

“You know what happened the last time you opened the door for me, right?”

“Don’t open the door again, Derek.”

Stiles hears her say; the words mean nothing to him, but Derek’s eyes are wide. She then turns to Stiles, having been seemingly aware of his presence all along.

“Look at him Derek, sure he looks nothing like me, but he’s the same. A corpse. A nothing.”

Only then she addresses Stiles directly. “And what are you doing here?”

“Can’t you see how there is nothing that you could ever possibly do for him?” She continues.

Stiles tries to say something, but he never felt more trapped inside his own skin. “You’re nothing but a corpse. You can’t actually help him. Only a human can do that, and well, thanks to you, he doesn’t have much of that left.” She snickers, and Stiles feels his heart lodge in his throat, engulfing him.

“He can if he wants to.” It’s Derek who speaks up, walks out from the shadow of the burnt house and towards Stiles. “You can be whoever you want to be.” He says, jaw strained, but eyes hopeful.

“I-I can.” Stiles smiles.

“Not after you ate his sister, lover boy.” The woman huffs a laugh now and Stiles flinches.

“Just try.” Derek says, a small smile threatening to form.

His whole vision suddenly blurs and everything blends, the colours bleed onto each other and he wakes up suddenly. He feels disorientated for a while. Whatever happened was exhilarating, and the sense of euphoria lingers inside of him until he realizes just how eerie and silent the house is.

Somewhere deep within himself he feared that it will happen, nonetheless, the shock that comes when he realizes he’s alone in the house again wrecks him.

He storms out, tries to hope that Derek might be outside, but there is no one in sight. Only abandoned houses and the clattering of debris as it is swept by the wind from one end of the street to another. He has no idea where Derek could have went, as far as he knows this town is his home, beyond that he knows nothing about Derek’s possible hiding places.

He wrecks his mind thinking, but everything falls short every time and only then he remembers just how incapable and useless he really is. The sun soars bright and everything is sickly warm and dry, the place seems to have its life sucked out of it, everything is brutally decayed to the zenith of desolation. It makes him feel sick, and he heads to the airport – only there he can call home. So he’ll go there and he’ll blend in because that’s all he can do – all he is capable of. He’ll stop thinking so much and he’ll forget about Derek, like he forgot about the rest of his life. He keeps walking idly, and shivers at the sudden cold breeze of the air, looking back he realizes just how far he already made it from the town, and only then realizes that evening already came and that everything is turning grey again.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I am sorry I didn't have much time to proof read it and it is unbeta'd, so all mistakes and errors mine, please do feel free to correct anything you'd like, and perhaps even provide your own suggestions.
> 
> Thank you for all your very generous comments x! I appreciate and value them more than anything. 
> 
> P.S: Lydia will come in the next chapter :D Boyd is the 'silent tall guy' btw. Allison is the one in Scott's memories and Kate is the one talking to Derek in Stiles' dream.


	6. Chapter 6

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The final chapter, which really includes two chapters in one. I hope that it is liked, and a satisfying ending.

It’s blank and stagnant and he doesn’t like this. It feels terrible; the sensation of regression. He tried to get to the surface and the depth clung onto him until he sunk again. He’s sinking, and he’s no longer adjusted to the cold and staleness, he looks into the deep, and all he sees are skeletal faces roaring – calling for him.

“Yo!” He recognizes the hoarse timbre of the calling, but he can’t quite put his finger on it. Suddenly everything blends and he snaps out of his daze. Scott stands there, only a couple of meters away, and there are others with him. They are nearby the broken bridge, water dripping from its sides onto the ground. Has it been raining? Pools of water had formed all around, and it startles him – just how out of it he had been. Is this the only thing he can look forward to?

“W-what?”  He’s baffled as to why they would be so far from the airport.

He doesn’t have time to think before Scott is on him, hugging him, albeit awkwardly. Only then he relaxes a little; Scott would never stop being his beacon.

“Y-you s-star-ted… so-methi… ng” He tries to get out and it’s almost gibberish, but Stiles nods, understanding.

Scott retreats his hand, and then points to his head meaningfully, eyes fixed on Stiles’.

“I-imag-es… Her. All-… and y-you.” He breaks out a grin there, a warm smile that seems so familiar it aches. God it aches so badly, a pain that brings back the days full of love and life.

“Memories.” The big guy says, coming closer to Scott from behind.

“D-dreams.” That catches all their attention, and they nod, awed.

Stiles huffs a laugh.

“Bonies v-v-very a-angry.” Scott then says seriously, but Stiles doesn’t care; he shakes his head. “They’re c-c-co… ming f-for you… a-nd hi-m...” The sudden chill freezes his body all over, and then the ice breaks and so does everything else.

“D-derek g-gone.” He can see the reflection of his expression in Scott’s eyes, and he wonders if he had ever looked this sad before.

Scott puts a hand on his shoulder; it’s tight and strong – comforting.

He feels something running down his face, and he assumes it’s the rain, falling again. He looks around, but the air is dry and empty.

“We n-need t-to f-fin-d h-him.” Scott gets out, determined.

Stiles nods, but it’s futile. He doesn’t know where to look. Derek brought him to his home and left the day after. He heard of camps risen by hunters to stand against corpses and offer protection to humans, but Stiles has no idea which one Derek would go to. Or if he’d even make it far enough before he is killed. He doesn’t see the hours passing, but they do, time seems so irrelevant to his slowed down mind. Chains bind him and everything keeps halting, but he focuses on Derek, on the possibility that somewhere within his imprisoned mind he can find a clue.

The others have assumed various positions during the time, all have sat around and closed their eyes. Seemingly moving on to their own world, waiting for Stiles’ own to uncover itself. They all drift to their dreams, but Stiles knows the answers aren’t there.

It is the big guy, whose eyes are almost yellow, that approaches him. “U-use y-your m-memories.” He smiles then, and sits to the left besides him, on the right there’s Scott, a dopey smile on his face as he stares at the growing clouds.

But he doesn’t have memories. Memories are what he lacks; they have abandoned him a long time ago. It’s devastating, the feeling he gets as he realizes just how empty he is. There’s something heavy lodged in his throat and it isn’t going down. He goes down onto his back and feels the grass scratching against his skin, looks at the darkening sky and remembers, because that he can do; he can remember. The images flow into his mind one by one, the first time he saw Derek – within Laura’s dream, and then when he saw him sitting with his back against the medical cabinets, knees shaking and breath hitching. He is scared of thinking just what he would have done if he didn’t have Laura’s memories, if he would have ever managed to control himself. The image of Derek, eyes glossy and looking at his side, where no more cabinets stand  – waiting for them to come; his grey tank shirt damp with sweat, and his legs – one hunched up – and the other lying limp on the floor, haunts him.

And then he gets it. _Laura’s memories._

His mind races and he quickly gets up; he brings up the flashes of her going to the airport, and dives deeper into the memory – they aren’t in the house, not even in Beacon Hills – they’re at a refuge in a forest – close to a camp. He doesn’t know the camp, or why they prefer to stay out of it – maybe it’s full – he assumes. He knows the path Laura took, and he can see Derek following her through the woods, into a village, and towards the airport.

He hopes, feeling more vigilant than ever, that the skeletons haven’t figured out where Derek is too.

“F-foll-ow m-me.” He says, voice loud, and albeit cracking a little, certain.

The others do.

-

They arrive at the stadium by nightfall; the sky is dark and it is a new moon. The grass is a plastic faded green, and the clouds burst into columns of ever falling water, but they keep going. They don’t stop. Walking from one side to the other of the huge field reminds him of the evening he spent with Derek, playing with the ball. He stops for a couple of seconds, just so that he can inhale the familiar scent, and remember it more vividly. He walks better now, and things aren’t as heavy. He’s more… human. He just hopes he’s human enough for Derek.

He’ll never be any better than this.

The others stop and choose to stay at the village, barely a mile away from the camp. It is hidden by hills and a ghastly fog of grey seems to cloak its entrance, but the towering lookouts hanging high search and scour the entire area around Camp Argents. He has never seen such a well-built camp, it isn’t small, hidden and defenceless, and instead it looks like a stronghold. Stiles wonders why, in Laura’s dreams, the two siblings seemed so uncomfortable here. He wonders why they left. The refuge isn’t far from the stronghold. He waves Scott and the others good bye before he continues on into the woods.

Doubt starts creeping in the farther he goes, letting himself be guided by the memories; what if Derek chose not to stay here? What if he had another destination? He uses the leaves of the trees as a cover, making sure none of the watch-towers' strobes of light show him out.

He arrives at the refuge, but it’s empty. He wonders if it had been evacuated; it’s made of a couple of half-brought down camps, which are without a doubt abandoned, and a house. The house is the only place Derek could be, and with that thought in mind he decides to go and knock. It stands in the middle of the camps, and he eerily wonders if it belongs to some soldier.

That wouldn’t be a good thing. He concludes, and swallows.

“Derek?” He tries to say, but it is nowhere near loud enough.

The door opens after what seems to be a very long stretch of time, and there’s Derek. Stiles grins, but instead a strong hand clenches into his shirt and he is dragged in. Somehow he finds himself with his back against the inner wall, pinned violently.

“What are you doing here!?” Derek is livid, Stiles can tell, and it kind of makes him sad.

“Err…”

“So this is the one you’ve been moping about this entire time?” A beautiful girl with strawberry blond hair, perfect eyes and – wow, _beautiful_. Stiles is a little smitten. She walks down the stairs, a bored condescending expression plastered on her face.

“Hi.” She waves nonchalantly.

And then he gulps at the thought of her being Derek’s girlfriend.       

“Hey.”

* * *

  
“So… you’re like attracted to your zombie friend… who killed Laura...” She’s staring at him like he’s insane, and well, he can’t blame her.

“I- I’m not attracted to him.” He lies aggresively.

She doesn’t buy it, having learned all his tricks from Laura. “So he killed her because he didn’t have a choice, and then he got her memories, so he could stop himself from eating you too,” She maps it all out with her hands, pointing at empty air and gesturing between them. “Now that is romance.”

He tries to speak, but she raises a hand up, still not finished. “And then he saved you and took you to his little zombie house of creepiness and nurtured you?” She sighs.

“Stiles.” He mutters.

“Huh? What the hell is a Stiles?” She turns back to him.

“His name is Stiles…” He looks everywhere but at her, and she just gawks at him for a couple of moments.

“No, I don’t think you’re crazy at all. I mean Laura warned me you were weird, but this, this is internet worthy – if the internet still existed.”

He pouts, annoyed at her. Lydia has been one of the few from Beacon Hills that managed to survive, and she, along with the argents, made their way north. She however preferred to live outside of the wall, instead choosing to build smaller camps to make area for expansion, until the evacuation started that is.

“Listen, you need some sleep, then we’ll talk about this later.” She claps her hands excitedly. “God I haven’t had this much drama since high school!” She squeals happily and bounces off the bed, walking out of the room. “Have sweet dreams about Stiles!

Derek groans.

He then lies there, in the bed, staring at the ceiling blankly, trying to deal with the fact that whatever he and Stiles had is gone forever now, when the door knocks. He sighs in frustration, the argents keep coming back asking them to hurry up and get into the wall. Lydia has been pivotal in the construction of the argents camp, and the only one Laura knew who could help them when things got too much, it is normal that the argents prioritize her safety – especially since she’s a very close friend to the daughter of the general.

When he opens the door to find Stiles his reaction is instinct; he immediately pulls him in and, in a moment of panic, pins him against the wall. It’s not the best decision he’s ever made, because Stiles is warm and slender and-

“What the hell are you doing here?” He says, fuming.

Stiles doesn’t have the time to react before Lydia is coming down the stairs.

“So this is the one you’ve been moping about this entire time?” She says smugly, and this time he’s the one who doesn’t know what he says. He allows himself to check Stiles out, glancing up and down momentarily, before he lets go of him and turns to Lydia.

“Hey.” Stiles says sheepishly.

Derek sighs. “Yes.”

“Oh… my… god…” It’s uncomfortable, even for him, how Lydia assesses Stiles shamelessly. “Come upstairs.” She finally decides, and goes to, presumably, her room.

* * *

“How long have you been dead?” Lydia is cupping Stiles’ face and checking every inch of him examining him meticulously. Derek wants to die instead of Stiles – well sort of.

“Ugh… I d-don’t k-know,” Stiles tries to say, desperate eyes looking at Derek for help, who just shrugs.

“How old are you?” She then asks.

“I don’t-“

“Because you look like you’re seventeen, that means you’re probably underage, but you could have been dead for a while and you might be like twenty, or thirty-“ Derek’s groan interrupts her.

“Lydia, please.”

“What? I just want to know.”

“God. He doesn’t even smell like rot. It’s amazing.” She is clearly awed, and she keeps reassessing every piece of information aloud.

Stiles flinches as if the fact that he smells offends him.

Derek rolls his eyes and strolls forward. “Stiles, why are you here?”

“I-I came t-to s-see you.”

“Isn’t that adorable!” Lydia clasps her hands together, light in her eyes.

“To-to sh-how everyone we’re c-c-changing.”

Derek raises an eyebrow. “We?”

“T-the o-others a-are all… c-changing.”

“Stiles… It doesn’t matter. Here they’ll shoot you in the head before you get the time to blink. You need to get out of here. Now.”

“T-there’s more!” Stiles says, voice alert and urgent. There’s something desperate in his voice, and it isn’t entirely because of the importance of whatever he has to say.

“B-bonies are c-coming. For us- You…” He swallows.

“Stiles don’t be ridi-“

Lydia grabs a hold of his wrist. “Wait, I think he may be right. The evacuation started just hours before you came, and there is no corpses amongst the ones coming.”

“Why me?”

“W-w-we s-started s-something… big.” He says it slowly, but there’s hope in his eyes, just like that of a child.

“We need to talk to Chris. He’s the only one who might listen to us.” Lydia reasons out, but Derek immediately shakes his head.

“He’ll kill Stiles.”

“Not if we fix him up… make him look human. He doesn’t smell, and he can talk. Sort of.”

“How the hell can we fix-“ Derek’s eyes go wide, but Stiles still looks confused.

Lydia smirks wildly and takes out her phone.

In thirty minutes, Allison is at their house with hair bleach, foundation and her bow. They sit Stiles on a chair in-front of the mirror, and start doing things to him that Derek doesn’t want to ever experience, so he simply lies with his back against the wall and sighs dramatically. He can’t help but feel sorry every time Stiles looks at him, face filled with panic and pure horror.

He has never seen Allison this dedicated, and Lydia is setting out plans with her hands gesturing all over Stiles and _touching_ him. It unnerves Derek. A little.

He just doesn’t want Stiles to feel uncomfortable.

It’s totally that, he reasons with himself.

He can hear his sister’s smug giggling somewhere and he pouts aggressively, glowering at thin air because it’s offensive.

“Are you kidding me?” He groans when Lydia switches on the music to _pretty woman_ , and then _midnight city_. _His life_. At-least Stiles seems to like the latter. When Stiles showers, they draw the curtains, but he can see his body where the thin fabric doesn’t meet, and it is a little disconcerting. There are bullet wounds in his body and a large knife wound stretches over his lower side, from his abdomen to the lower of his back. He wonders what could have scarred his torso like this, and it scares him, how little he knows of Stiles, and what he used to be.

The idea that the wound might have been there before he became a corpse makes him shudder. He wants to ask, but he knows he cannot; he won’t get an answer. He tears his eyes away, and goes back to the bedroom. He leaves Lydia and Allison to take care of him and only when, twenty minutes later, Lydia calls for him that he walks to the corridor and opens the door.

 He can’t help but lick his lips a little, and stare. Stiles looks stunning, fair pale skin and dark hair and- wow. He breathes, swallows, and nods.

 “You look hot.” Lydia concludes, face proud as she checks him up and down, while Allison nods sagely.

Getting to talk with Chris when there’s an incoming massive attack proves to be difficult, but Allison’s presence and Lydia’s witty replies get them where they want. The inside of the wall isn’t any different from outside, a lot of camps and small houses are aligned in a grid like structure, and it barely takes up the space of two streets, but it is something.

They go to the base immediately, which is just a tall building that makes a part of one of the two look out towers on the wall. The Argents are all there, and he can already feel his skin itch with discomfort.

“Allison, it isn’t safe here.” Chris’ eyes shift between them, and then land on Stiles.

 “We need to talk to you, about something big.”

 “Bigger than hundreds of skeletons marching their way here?”

 “It’s about that. We know why they’re coming, and how we can fight them.” It’s Lydia who steps forward and takes charge.

 “What do you mean?”

 “Derek, explain to him.” That was unexpected, and Derek forces himself to breathe.

 “The corpses are curing themselves. Somehow we set something in them and they’re starting to become alive again.”

 “That’s ridiculous. What the corpses are doing is attack us, Derek.”

 “The Skeletons are, because they recognized what’s happening.”

 “Derek, I know you lost your sister, and I am very sorry-“

 “We have proof!” Lydia snaps, and that gets his attention. Stiles steps forward and mutters a ‘hi’.

 “…Wait a minute…” His brows furrow, and then his eyes narrow as it dawns on him. “Is that a corpse?!”

 His voice remains silent, but it’s furious. “Yes. And he saved me, and came to warn us about what’s happening.”

 Chris almost looks like he’s debating it before Gerard appears from behind them and points the gun at Stiles.

 “Don’t!” Derek warns, but everyone knows just how brutal Gerard is, and Derek-

 Allison aims her bow at Gerard, close to him with stern eyes. “What are you doing?”

 "Dad. Sorry, I know mum died because of corpses, but I can’t let you kill him.”

 Lydia immediately pulls Stiles with her and he goes along with the two through the back of the base, quickly running down the stairs and out of the building.

 The alarms go off, and they run.

**Transference**

“Where can we go!?”  It’s Derek the first to speak as they run.

“How do I know? We can’t go back to my house, the soldiers will be there.” She puts up a calculated front, but Derek can feel her panicking.

“Follow me.” Stiles speaks up, and as they cross the third block and make it to the other side, they rush out of the camp, hearing the loud thump of the gate enclosing behind them. They barely make it out, and they can hear the multitude of soldiers shouting orders and organising themselves.

They walk through the woods and towards the first settlement; the closest village to the camp, which has been taken by other corpses, that he remembers this as the exact same path he took when he went to look for his sister.

There are around fourty corpses waiting for them in the football field.

Lydia shrieks, and jerks back.

“S-safe here.” Moments after Stiles speaks they hear the crawling of skeletons in the vicinity, groups of them swarming down buildings, running towards them and roaring with fury and hunger.

“I bet we're not safe from them, though, and there’s no way we’re gonna hold them all off.” Lydia says as she looks, horrified, at the incoming beasts.

“We’ll …all f-fight.” The corpses groan in unison, and hell breaks loose.

-

Soon it’ll be over. Derek wants to believe, but they keep on coming, and he knows the corpses can’t stop them. The skeletons are everywhere, appearing like ghosts from each crack and opening.

The arena is no longer a decayed light green, now it is black and red and chaotic. Stiles quickly grabs his hand and leads him away from the fighting, and they go to the nearest building; a tall tower that used to stand as a battle front of the village. Derek knows it’s part of Lydia’s projects to expand the defences, and although it never took ground, the building is strong and well barricaded.

He knows it won’t stop them.

As soon as they enter the building they lock the door, and immediately run for the stairs, dozens of skeletons run behind them and throw themselves against the walls and entrance. Steadily bringing it down. He keeps on climbing after Stiles, but suddenly another one of them appears, beating through a window and landing on the stairs up. They’re blocked, if they go down the skeletons will get to them, and more are getting inside from the window. Derek tries to look down, see if maybe they can jump, but they’re already too high up. The skeleton rushes down towards them, but Stiles quickly outmanoeuvres it and pushes it over the metallic railing. The gritting roar that erupts from the skeleton as it falls is piercing.

Three more manage to climb in and Derek kicks one of them down, but the other two knock Stiles down, and reach over him, ready to bite through flesh as if it’s alive. Derek manages to pull one off while Stiles struggles with the other. There isn’t allot of space, and the skeleton overwhelms him, strength brutal and unrelenting. He’s being pinned against the wall and he barely registers the sharp thump his head makes as he hits the concrete. The skeleton opens its mouth, and he reluctantly swallows in fear. He’s almost ready to brace himself when he realizes that he needs to fight, this time he doesn’t have a choice. He has to do it. To live.

He raises his leg and, with as much strength as he can muster, kicks the skeleton. It staggers away, but doesn’t retreat its hands. Derek keeps kicking and struggling, not wanting to die, scared of the idea of dying for the very first time in a long while.

Suddenly the corpse is being pulled off of him and down the railings; Stiles is smiling, but the victory is short-lived, the others advance ever closer. The two of them climb the stairs faster until they reach an open area, tools and machines spread around hazardly, signs of plans of construction obvious, but forgone. He doesn’t know just how terrible the fighting is in the field, or all around the village for that matter. There are windows at the opposite side, and they quickly rush to them; the windows overlook the other side of the city, where everything is deadly quiet and the ruckus that is happening is still incoming. Buildings from this side are just as broken, but they circle around the arena and the outer part of the settlement like a barrier. A large pool stands beneath them, but they are way too high up to survive.

At-least he is. Stiles is not.

“Go.”

He shouts, voice demanding and rough, and he can already hear just how close the skeletons are.

Stiles raises his hand, tries to say something, but then closes his mouth again. For a moment Derek is lost staring at how red his lips look; how alive.

And he nods because he wants Stiles to live.

When the first skeleton climbs up to the open area, it screeches at them, and Derek wonders if jumping off would be a better death than by their hands. He doesn’t get the time to think about it; Stiles pulls him close and runs out of the window; the grip on his sides is tight and it almost hurts, but Stiles’ hands wrap close around him and, like a caccoon, shield him from the incoming impact.

The few seconds that happen as they fall is surreal. The wind rushes up and threatens to tear them apart and their flesh coils up in waves against the air. It would be exhilarating, Derek thinks, if not how absurd it really is.

And then they hit the water, and it’s cold as it penetrates where Stiles can’t cover up and reaches his flesh. Stinges him like a burning whip or a poker. He wants to scream with the sudden shock of pain, but then everything goes eerily calm, and he can feel himself disentangling himself from Stiles’ hold, and falling to the pool floor.

He lies there for a few moments, eyes hazily open because he wants to see what’s happening above, and then he sees Stiles coming down for him. And it gets to him. It gets to him just how human Stiles is; just how extraordinary something so supposedly dull can be. Something which is supposed to feed and just _exist_ , learned how to be alive. Willed itself on its own.

It. He used to think of Stiles.

He can’t remember a time when he didn’t know Stiles as anything but _Stiles_. As anything but _him_. Derek smiles a little when Stiles wraps his arms around his waist, and then pulls him up. It’s just a tiny upward tilt of his lips, but it’s there.

“You okay?” Stiles says, breathless.

“Yeah.” Derek huffs a laugh, and he can’t even stop himself.

Then there’s a sharp pang in the air that twists and shocks something inside of him and the water turns red.

He looks up to where the sound originates and he can see Gerard and part of his battalion.

“The skeletons and corpses may be fighting each other but that doesn’t mean anything to me.” His voice is cracked and hoarse, and he seems to Derek like someone who had grown so accustomed to seeing blood that it was the only thing that he could live for.

And then he noticed something.

“I have proof he is alive! Look! He’s bleeding. Corpses don’t bleed.” He is almost grateful for it, and then he realizes just what it means. “Wait, you’re bleeding. Are you-?”

“I’m okay. It’s healing I think.”

“Gerard, I swear to god if you try anything I’ll put you down.” It’s Allison that speaks to him this time, coming just in time.

“So will I.” It’s Chris who then talks, and something settles inside Derek.

Gerard nods, and then pulls his gun down.

*****

**Prologue**

**-          3 months later**

“It was a wonderful service.” Stiles says, eyes lidded and pace heavy. They’re standing outside the memorial garden, built to honour all of those who died battling the skeletons. Lydia arranged a private funeral to be held for Laura, but they decided her resting place would be in the garden, her headstone a large wolf carved in stone, howling up at the sky. The garden is large, full of grass and white fences, cherry trees and flowers bloom in every corner. Many visit the place every day, still too raw from the pain of loss. There are small and larger statues everywhere, and at the very left corner, there’s a statue of a skeleton, reaching out from the ground, and a plate underneath it with a message to all those who succumbed. Derek feels it’s appropriate, in this war everyone was a victim, and even the bonies were once human.

“It was,” He feels uncomfortable too, but his hands are still tightly holding Stiles’ own and he can breathe now. It’s ending. “Stiles… I need to ask you something.”

He doesn’t stop walking, but their pace is slow and Derek keeps his head bent down.

“Did Laura hate me?” It comes out fast, and quick, but Stiles’ eyes open in awareness.

“No, she didn’t,” Stiles says, smiling. “She was angry. She was angry at herself for not being able to comfort you, and she was angry that you couldn’t be happy. And maybe she hated you, but she loved you… a-lot.” He pauses, takes a breath and smells the scent of the roses and the green, “She loved you enough to make me reach out and do something. Enough to freaking save the world. It’s been nearly two months since the skeletons were eradicated, and look how everything is being rebuilt so fast. It’s all thanks to her.”

“Yeah.” Derek nods, and they keep walking towards the exit of the memorial. Their apartment in Beacon Hills is one of the first to be built, and Lydia will grill them if they aren’t there in time for the planning.

"Funerals make me horny, by the way." Stiles then says, and they walk a little faster.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> An enormous thanks to derekstilinski for the inspiration, and to all those who took their time to read and/or comment.
> 
> All and any kind of feed-back is more than welcome!
> 
> x


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